


Together we are not adrift

by ephemeralfangirl



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-11
Updated: 2016-10-11
Packaged: 2018-08-21 19:39:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,832
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8258074
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ephemeralfangirl/pseuds/ephemeralfangirl
Summary: Cat comes home for a business trip to find Kara in a fortress of pillows.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Hey guys!
> 
> This refers to the sleeping habits Cat noticed Kara had in Living the Unforeseen, but you don't actually need to read the other one to read this one. I mean, please do, but you don't need to.

Cat was tired. There was something about traveling that made her bone weary in a way that just sitting shouldn't. Having your own plane did mitigate the frustrations of flying somewhat, but even luxury couldn't keep her from wishing for her bed, for her home, but most of all for her family. She'd been in Sydney for a week and a half of the two weeks she had been supposed to be there and she'd just had enough. 

It had come up on her in a Skype call with Carter and Kara. Her girlfriend was staying at the penthouse while Cat was away, allegedly keeping an eye on her son. The two of them had been talking about the new shark exhibit at the aquarium they had spent their Sunday at, their voices overlapping as they tried to tell her everything they had seen. Carter had casually slung an arm around Kara's shoulder as he had gushed about the behind the scenes look she had gotten them, either by using the Grant name or by flashing her press credentials. Cat had felt something come loose in her chest. When Kara had absentmindedly tugged on Carter's hair and smiled at her softly through the lens with a “we'll go again when you come home, you should see it,” that something had rolled over inside and closed her throat with a longing so fierce, Cat had been barely able to breathe around it. 

She didn't want a do over day, she wanted to be right there with them. Not just in the brilliant visit they’d had, she had wanted to take part in the “boring" moments. She'd longed to tut at them while they’d had the toothpaste foam contest Carter had obviously won. She had wanted to be in the middle of the side by side read they were going to have after the call, rolling her eyes at the foot push fight they always denied having under her legs.

Mostly she missed them; the clean scent of Carter's freshly showered hair when she got her goodnight hug, the warmth of his back under her hand when she checked he was asleep before making her way to her own bed and, more often than not these days, Kara.

She had craved Kara's skin, the feel of it, the scent of it, the taste of it. She had needed her warmth in bed. She had yearned for the way her girlfriend was always seeking her out in sleep, whether it was in a full body cuddle or simply a hand on her hip; a fuzzy sock clad foot along her calf or even Kara's whole back against her side. They were always touching and this week Cat had found herself waking, hands reaching into emptiness for her, the pangs of loneliness so acute when her fist had closed on air that she had been unable to go back to sleep.

Those pangs had been so bad when she had spoken to them, scrubbed clean and ready for bed that she had shot an email to her assistant. She’d instructed her to cram all her remaining meetings in one day, even if she had to finish in the wee hours of the morning. Rebecca had come through and she had known well enough to have the CatCo jet on standby, ready to bring Cat home the minute she had been done. It had still felt far too late to Cat, but at least now she was home. Dead on her feet at 3:20 in the morning, but her own bed was waiting for her with her girlfriend in it, so it was all worth it. 

She took off her heels before she entered the penthouse, trying to be as silent as possible. She left her two suitcases by the door and tiptoed through the apartment, trying her best not to wake either one of her loves. Carter could sleep through anything, but Kara was trickier. Since they'd gotten together, Kara had learned to alleviate Cat's guilt and stay in bed on the not so rare evenings Cat came in after her, so she might very much still be asleep. 

She stopped by Carter's bedroom first and walked in, the love in her throat making it hard to breathe. Her baby boy wasn't such a baby anymore. A growing foot was peaking from the blanket and past the edge of the mattress, a living contrast to when his whole foot was shorter than her palm. Cat gingerly circled his ankle with her thumb and forefinger, lifting the blanket to tuck the foot back in. She put her hand on his back, the soft hiss of his breathing going straight to her heart. She kissed the too long curls and made a mental note to schedule him an appointment. She sneaked back out of his room and into her own, stopping in the doorway.

There was a large lump in the middle of her king size bed. All she could see of Kara was the top of her head, the blond hair shining in the light coming from the television. Cat let out a sigh of contentment and felt her entire body relax as she reached for the hem of her button down. She stripped naked just inside the room, tossing the clothes in the general direction of her closet before she walked to her bed. She turned off the television and took the end of the blanket, only wanting to cuddle next to Kara and sleep for a week.

She lifted the blanket and stopped with a puzzled frown. Every spare pillow in the house had been brought into the bed and it formed a foot tall barrier around Kara, giving her girlfriend just enough space to sleep flat on her back if she needed to. Cat had known Kara to sleep like this before, but in all the nights they’d shared a bed, she had never done this. Maybe Cat hadn't been the only one having trouble sleeping. The thought pleased her and she hoisted herself up over the pillows and into Kara's nest, the entirety of her front touching the younger woman’s back.

If her skin could have sighed in relief from the contact, it would have. Kara was warm and solid against her chest in a way that felt like she had longed for this her entire life. God, she had missed this. She pressed herself closer to Kara and tangled their legs as a little sleepy voice was heard. “Cat?”

“Ssh, go back to sleep,” she whispered in Kara's ear, her nose lowering to nestle into that fragrant space where neck met shoulder. Kara smelled divine, just her soap and that sweet smell that was unique to the Kryptonian. Cat could have picked her out of a line up on that alone. She let her lungs fill with Kara, her hand followed the dip of the waist before her to the bottom of the t-shirt until Cat could slide her hand in, seeking as much skin as she could.

“You're home,” there was wonder and love in Kara's voice and Cat closed her eyes, unsure if anyone had ever used that tone of voice for her before. “I was just dreaming about you.”

Kara struggled to turned toward her, their limited space making the endeavour harder, but Cat took advantage of her movement to tug her shirt up and mostly off. She hit the pillows and Kara lowered her arms to help free herself of it, her slender fingers finding Cat's hip. The older woman wanted as much contact between them as she could. She followed willingly when Kara leaned against her, fitting their curves together perfectly from toes to lips. The sleepy flavor of Kara felt like coming home, but still with that thrill of jumping off a cliff together, excitement and comfort in equal parts that settled in her heart and low in her belly. They parted for breath, but only far enough away for air to pass between them, their lips brushing together when Cat asked: “Good dreams?”

The wicked grin Kara gave her was something she hadn’t known the young woman could make before they got together. It gentled when a single questing fingertip followed the ridges of her spine, the hand turning downward to explore her cheek, pushing her closer to Kara. “This is better.”

Cat nodded and kissed Kara again, first her lower lip, then her upper before she slipped her tongue slowly into Kara's mouth. The friction loosened something in Cat’s stomach, a ball of anxiety she hadn’t realised was there until it wasn’t. She brought her hands up and framed Kara’s face, checking the beautiful features in case something had changed. 

“I missed you.”

The words spilled out of her mouth before she could stop them. Cat looked away from overly perceptive blue eyes and her hands started to slip from smooth cheeks in embarrassment. Cat didn’t do confessions. She reciprocated only when she knew it was safe to, but she never spoke of feelings first. It was a lesson she had learned too early in life to discard, but Kara made her break all her rules. 

Strong hands covered hers and held them in place, lips seeking her palms, the inside of wrists before Kara pulled on her hands to get Cat’s arms around her neck. Her arms buried themselves into the wall that surrounded them as Kara’s lips pressed against her own, not quite a peck, but not quite a kiss either, more of a connection until Cat melted against her. 

“I missed you too. So much.”

Kara kissed her again, this time for real, this time without holding back and Cat sighed into it, landing once more in a safe place. Kara pulled away and buried her face in Cat’s neck. “I missed you like this, your skin against mine. You can never go away that long again.”

The remark should have made Cat bristle. It always had in the past when other people had said it. There was always this possessive and demanding undertone that put Cat’s back up and made her lash out, but Kara was different. It was longing that made her speak. It was because she genuinely missed Cat rather than because she felt unimportant. She didn’t want to put limits on her lover and it made all the difference to Cat.

She tried to push Kara onto her back, wanting to lay down on the younger woman, so every inch of them would touch, but her girlfriend was backed up against her fence of pillows and couldn't move. With a frustrated huff, Cat tried to push at the offensive barrier, but found herself unable to undo the brick wall like construction.

“God, why are there so many pillows in here?” She pushed harder and caught a glimpse of Kara's embarrassed face. “What is it?”

Kara’s hands left her skin and she raised to her knees in the limited space they had to undo her construction. Cat stopped her, fingers on wrist to halt the movement. “Just tell me.”

“I couldn't sleep,” Kara sighed, still looking away from Cat. 

Her shoulders were hunched in, closing in on herself in a way that Cat hadn't seen since the early days of assistant-hood. To comfort them both, she let go of the wrist she still held and traced random patterns up her inner arm, until the elbow stopped her path and then she switched to the outside, up around the shoulder and down the long lines of Kara's back. Her lover relaxed, but not enough. 

“I didn't sleep particularly well, either,” the confession calmed Kara down and she laid down on her back, inching toward Cat who took full advantage of the position to drape herself over Kara. She went boneless, sighing in gratification, her thumb stroking over the ridged of Kara’s ribs. This was what she had wanted, had longed for. She could have fallen asleep there. But she struggled with wakefulness long enough to ask again: “Tell me.”

Kara bit her lip and looked into sleepy green eyes before she nodded. “When I landed, I couldn't stay asleep. I’d close my eyes and if I moved, I'd wake up panicking.”

The thought of a young, lost Kara made Cat's heart lurch and she tightened her arm around the young hero. “Why?”

“My pod was really snug. I mean, really, really snug. If I would have had space it would have meant that I was loose from it and I was… adrift.”

The hesitation in the word spoke for itself and Cat didn't think she could hold Kara tight enough. She turned her head and kissed the shoulder she was lying on, hoping to anchor them both in this bed, but she shuddered at the possibility. All that had stood between Kara and never making it to this moment, had been that tiny pod. She wondered if Kara would object to having it cast in gold.

“So you built yourself a fortress to know you weren’t?”

 

Kara shook her head and hugged Cat back, kissing the top of her head. “Not when I got here. My pod was in the shed and I slept in it for like the first six months. It wasn’t great, but I slept. And then we took a trip. I couldn’t sleep in the hotel at all and I kept having panic attacks and Alex was freaking out because we were sharing that hotel room and she didn’t know what to do and we were not in a good place.”

The voice was so tiny that if they hadn’t been so close together, Cat never would have heard it. She looked up and kissed the underside of Kara's chin, keeping her lips against the skin, trying to bring her back to right now, to the two of them together, safe. She felt Kara swallow hard, and she chased the vibration of a hum, kissing down the column of Kara’s throat.

“Alex figured that my problem was open space, so she took all the pillows from the room, and some from I don't know where and built me a pillow fort. We got in and we slept. We tried it again the next night and it worked for a bit.”

“What changed?” this conversation was breaking Cat into tiny pieces. Kara was so good and kind that it seemed unfair that she had suffered so much. It angered her to see her lover hurting from choices she never got to make, but Cat felt it was important to know.

“The quiet. I'd wake up all snug and I'd hear nothing and I'd panic thinking I was still stuck in the phantom zone. When sound came back, I'd be too far along to calm down. So Alex gave me her Walkman at night so I wouldn't keep her awake. Tv's just more comfortable than sleeping with headphones.”

It sounded so matter of fact that Cat's heart lurched. As far as coping mechanisms went it wasn't bad, but it seemed so unfair that she’d had to find so many for something as simple as sleep.

“You seem ok when we share a bed, is there anything you need us to do? Because I’m perfectly fine having the tv on.”

Kara's demeanour changed entirely, the embarrassment and anxiety left, replaced by what felt like peace and she rubbed Cat's back, suddenly the one offering comfort. “I don't need anything else but you.”

“Kara, I'm serious. If…”

Kara's hand covered her mouth and Cat glared up at her. No one stopped her from talking, ever. But the playful glimmer in Kara's eyes stopped Cat from biting her. The look softened as the hand fell from her face to her chest.

“I fall asleep listening to your heart, it's the first thing I hear when I open my eyes. And if it's not enough, I just have to find you and touch you and I know that I'm where I'm meant to be.”

Tears gathered at the corner of green eyes but she didn't let them fall. Instead, she lifted herself up and kissed Kara thoroughly but slowly, a complete connection that filled them both with the gratitude Cat felt at having the young Kryptonian in her life.

“I love you,” the whisper came from Cat, who was still a little afraid that the words, she, wouldn't be accepted as worthy. The worry was only in her mind as Kara almost vibrated in pleasure when she heard them.

“I love you. Now sleep, I'll show you how much in morning,” the cheeky promise was spoken with a smile and a hand reaching for one of the discarded blankets. 

Kara covered them both, and Cat felt the wall at her back, suddenly not a hindrance to feeling more of her girlfriend, now it felt like a protection, like the only thing that had stood between them and never being here.

**Author's Note:**

> Yeah, so it's not so much about it being a cute thing as me being a horrible person. :) Sorry.
> 
> Also I wanted to thank everyone here for their support and the lovely reviews and kudos I've gotten. You guys are amazing.
> 
> Thank you so much for reading.


End file.
